Autogenerative high pressure digestion: Future potentials and constraints

Autogenerative high pressure digestion: Future potentials and constraints

Lindeboom, R.E.F.
Zagt, C.E.
Shin, S.G.
Weijma, J.
Plugge, C.M.
van Lier, J.B.

Civil Engineering and Geosciences

Water Management

2013-06-25

Biogas generated in waste (water) treatment facilities is increasingly regarded as an important source of renewable energy. However, generally, the CH4 content in biogas ranges between 55-70%, depending waste(water) composition, and cannot be applied directly for high grade applications such as gas grid injection or vehicle fuel. Conventional biogas upgrading technologies are only cost-efficient when treating biogas flows exceeding 100 Nm3/h. Therefore, cost-effective external biogas upgrading, to remove H2O, CO2, H2S and other trace impurities, was assumed to pose a major challenge for the further dissemination of small-scale decentralized anaerobic digestion technology. Consequently, an integrated CO2-scrubbing mechanism, denominated as Autogenerative High Pressure Digestion (AHPD) was introduced. Previous work already showed that working pressures up to 90 bar and >95% CH4-content of the biogas are feasible. This work explores the future potential of AHPD by discussing constraints on the requirement of Acid Neutralizing Capacity (ANC), and the role of mineral addition. Although not the main focus of this work, insights on kinetics and population dynamics are used to support the findings. The fact that a continuous AHPD 1.5 m3 reactor is currently in operation brings the technology very close to practice.

pressure digestion
biogas upgrading
mineral supplementation
acid neutralizing capacity
kinetics
population dynamics
microbial diversity

http://resolver.tudelft.nl/uuid:0bbd0066-681f-43f6-bdfd-fdaab5dd77c6

13th World Congress on Anaerobic Digestion "Recovering (bio) Resources for the World", Santiago de Compostela, Spain, 25-28 June 2013; preprint

Institutional Repository

conference paper

(c) 2013 The Author(s)